‘They’re afraid to arrest me’
Minutes before an undercover team of U.S. marshals captured Ed Brown on the front porch of his fortified Plainfield home, he told one of the agents officials wouldn’t arrest him, according to the marshal, who testified at Brown’s trial for conspiracy and weapons possession yesterday.
“He said, ‘They’re afraid to arrest me. If they arrest me, the marshal is going to die, the chief of police is going to die, the sheriff is going to die. It’s going to be a war,’ ” said W.S. Robinson, the unarmed marshal who restrained Brown and brought him into custody.
Ed and his wife, Elaine, were arrested Oct. 4, 2007, after a nearly nine-month standoff with federal agents at the concrete, castle-like home. Throughout the standoff, the couple issued threats against law enforcement figures and promised a shootout if anyone tried to arrest them. They are being tried together in federal court on 11 felony charges and face virtual life sentences.
Their lawyers say the Browns were armed only because they believed federal marshals wanted to kill them.
A narrative of the arrest has emerged through public statements by the couple. Robinson’s testimony yesterday, illustrated by photographs and a videotape recorded minutes after the arrest, added new details. It was the first time any representative of the U.S. Marshals Service had commented publicly about the operation.
The takedown
Robinson described how agents entered the property largely without weapons. He and another man were unarmed, one man had a handgun, and a fourth marshal carried a Taser. A fifth man, a confidential informant the couple knew as “Dutch,” did not carry a weapon.
They came with supplies the couple had requested from a West Lebanon commercial property that was once Elaine Brown’s dental office. Although agents arrived with a truck bed full of supplies, Robinson said the Browns behaved distrustfully. As four of the men unloaded the truck into a garage, Robinson said Ed Brown kept his distance and held an assault rifle at waist height, sweeping it from man to man.
“He said pretty early on, ‘I don’t know you all very well. I don’t trust you,’ ” Robinson said.
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